


Winter Fox

by Shinku_Tsuuki



Series: Thousands Year Tales [3]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Drabble Sequence, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, My very minor ship, Random Encounters, Randomness, Yokai AU, Yôkai, poor tanaka
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-09
Updated: 2017-12-09
Packaged: 2019-02-12 14:48:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12961713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shinku_Tsuuki/pseuds/Shinku_Tsuuki
Summary: “Very well, then. Let’s meet again when you’ve fully fixed that broken heart of yours, human.”“QUIT CURSING ME WITH YOUR EXISTENCE, YOU DAMN FOX!”





	Winter Fox

**Author's Note:**

> This. This can be read as SunaTana (the rarest of my rare ships), but also can be read as not. 
> 
> Warning: Suna being his usual self + a trickster kitsune.

(In his childhood, Ryuunosuke saw a beautiful fox spirit)

* * *

**(1)**

Snow did not fall too heavily that day, so Mother let him and Yuu play outside. They still had to wear layers of clothes, though; those clothes restricted his movements, but since Ryuu did not want to get scolded nor freeze, he wore it begrudgingly.

 

(Mother’s scolding came first, because angry Mother is a scary Mother; the last time the Hannya side appeared, Ryuu got a nightmare for two days straight)

 

Yuu was being his usual cheerful self. They built snowmen together, played snowball fight together, and finally played hide and seek—although he did not remember the reason for the last one. They just kind of wanted to, and so they played hide in seek all the way around the village. He lost at jan-ken-pon and had to be the ‘it’. After counting down from a hundred, Ryuu started looking for Yuu.

 

That was how he ended up seeing that fox spirit, who was wandering serenely on the border between the forest and the village.

 

The spirit’s hair was a very dark black. It was short, straight, and its bangs covered a little bit of its face when the wind blew. The kimono the spirit wore was thick (Ryuu did not had the chance to count its layers) and also black in color. It had silvery white fox ears with black tips; after Ryuu counted silently, its tails were three, also in same color as his ears.

 

(For some reason, the spirit looked sparkling in Ryuu’s eyes.)

 

And yet, the thing that attracted Ryuu’s attention the most was its eyes.

 

Ryuu remembered the heat suddenly flared up on his cheeks when the spirit caught him standing stunned from behind a tree. He also remembered that the spirit slowly lifted its arm, hiding its mouth behind its long kimono sleeves.

 

Its pretty, narrow black eyes narrowed again, to the point they almost closed.

 

Was it because the spirit got scared? Or was it because the spirit was _laughing_ at him?

 

Before Ryuu had the chance to ask, the spirit vanished.

* * *

**(2)**

“I saw a fox spirit just now!”

 

Mother almost dropped the plate he was washing. He looked at Ryuu in disbelieve. “Fox spirit? You didn’t go to the forest today, did you?”

 

Ryuu shook his head vigorously. “I didn’t! It appeared on the village border! Yuu and I were playing hide and seek this morning; I lost at jankenpon and had to be the it and—“

 

“Okay, Ryuu, breathe first—good boy—now, what happened again?”

 

And so Ryuu recounted his meeting with the fox spirit. Or kitsune, like what adults always called them. He heard some of them were bad, that they often destroy the crops or tricking people and making ruckus. However, he also heard from Uncle Akaashi that there were also good kitsunes. “Unfortunately, though, the good ones are rare and tend to hide somewhere, deep in the forest,” Uncle Akaashi told him later that day, when Mother invited him to dinner.

 

“The one I saw disappeared after he saw me. Does that count as bad or good?” Ryuu asked with mouth full of rice. Mother pulled his ear gently, reminding him not to talk with mouth full of food. Uncle Akaashi finished his meal first; he was a big eater, just like Yuu and Little Shoyo. Now, Uncle Akaashi was playing with Shoyo, who was sitting on his lap, eyes half-closed and looked ready to fall asleep.

 

Uncle Akaashi was silent for a moment. “Did it do something strange before disapearing?”

 

“Nah! It just covered its nose and mouth with kimono sleeve.”

 

“Then perhaps it’s a good one.” Another moment of silence. “You didn’t feel something strange after that, did you?”

 

Ryuu shut his eyes tight, crossing his arms across his chest. “There is… something strange, actually.”

 

When he opened his eyes, both Mother and Uncle Akaashi were already on his sides. Their expressions were similar. Mother immediately asked where was the injured place; Uncle Akaashi checked his arms and neck and face and whatnot. Among the sudden ruckus, Ryuu had the chance to speak again, “Um, actually, it’s my chest--?!”

 

Now both Mother and Uncle Akaashi looked horrified. On Uncle Akaashi’s urging (“Quick, Sugawara-san, please get Oikawa here as soon as possible!”), Mother stood up and ran toward the door. Ryuu was able to stop him, fortunately. “No, Mom! It’s not actually painful! My heart just won’t stop beating faster every time I try to remember its face; it’s just that!”

 

And then, everything seemed to stop.

* * *

**(3)**

Ryuu wandered again to the village border with red ears and also red (from being pinched too hard) cheeks.

 

The spirit was also there. It saw Ryuu’s condition (Ryuu felt like the spirit was looking at his ears and cheeks; Mother’s pull on his ear and Uncle Akaashi’s legendary pinches _hurt_ ), was silent again for a while, and then repeated the same motion like yesterday. Before it got the chance to disappear again, Ryuu was already running toward it and—

 

“Gotcha!”

 

\--well.

 

Mission (tackling the fox spirit): _accomplished_.

 

**.**

 

Upon a closer look, the fox spirit’s beauty made Ryuu unable to say anything. His tongue went numb; his body went paralyzed from shock of seeing the beauty up close. Ryuu was on top of the spirit’s body now, gawking at the spirit’s face with face redder than the pinches’ mark.

 

The fox spirit looked amused, for a reason.

 

“Are you having a crush on me, little boy?”

 

When he heard the spirit’s deep voice, though, his mind went blank.

 

That was a male voice.

 

Coming out from this beauty of a spirit’s mouth.

 

Simply put, Ryuunosuke, ten years old, was currently experiencing the pain of first heartbreak.

* * *

**(4)**

Mother laughed good-heartedly at him when he recounted that one heartbreaking meeting. He patted Ryuu’s back gently as he laughed, hugging Ryuu when tears started to gather on his eyes and threatening to fall to his cheeks. All Mother did, as he laughed non-stop.

 

Yuu did not help much. He only gave Ryuu a thumb up, saying, “It’s okay, Ryuu! You’ll get a better one when we grow up later! It’ll totally be a prettier one, I promise!” then asked Mother what would they have for lunch. Half-crying and half-laughing, Mother replied, “I-I’ll prepare red rice.” He coughed a few times. “We’re celebrating Ryuu’s first step toward adolescence today. Can you please invite Uncle Akaashi and Uncle Bokuto, Yuu?”

 

Ryuu felt like he was going to cry.

* * *

**(5)**

Ever since that heart-breaking day, Ryuu refused to go near the village border. No one ordered him to go there, so he was safe and _almost_ forgot said incident for nine years old long.

 

_Almost_ being the key here.

 

**.**

 

Ryuu stared at Mother as if he was growing another head. Mother, on the other hand, was smiling his trademark smile as if he did not ask Ryuu to go near the village border for a chore: gathering firewood together with Uncle Bokuto.

 

“Mom. Did you just. Asked me to—“

 

“Gather firewood at the forest with Uncle Bokuto. Yep.”

 

“—didn’t you remember—“

 

“That incident? Of course I did.”

 

“—and yet—“

 

Mother inhaled deeply. He put his hands on Ryuu’s shoulders, his eyes staring directly to Ryuu’s eyes. Ryuu flinched at the painful grip on his shoulders, not to mention the piercing stare Mother gave him. “You’re an adult, aren’t you?” Ryuu nodded stiffly. Mother also nodded at that.  "A manly adult should be able to face his worst memory like that never happened before. Shrug it off, but never forget it. Take a lesson from it to prevent same things happened again. Understand, Ryuu?”

 

At that moment, Mother looked manlier than Father and Ryuu was moved to tears. Saluting, he went to Uncle Bokuto’s place to finish said mission. All with tears streaming down to his cheeks like a waterfall.

 

And that was his first meeting after nine peaceful years with that heartbreaker of a spirit.

 

Ever since that day, Ryuu had listed that spirit as ‘ _Yako_ ’ in his own book.

* * *

**(6)**

Another winter day. Another snowy day. Another going to village border, although he was not alone this time.

 

And thus, another meeting with that fox spirit who broke his heart nine years ago.

 

For some reason, it only appeared when no one else beside Ryuu was around.

 

As expected, the spirit hid his chuckle behind his long sleeve. Again. “It’s been a long time since our last meeting,” he said, with the same deep voice as before. “How’s your heartbreak? Have you found someone to fix it yet?”

 

Ryuu’s left eye twitched. This spirit was as savage as Kei, if not worse.

 

He ignored the spirit, pretending not to see him nor hear the savage greeting. He pulled his axe, started chopping the old tree, and kept chopping it until the tree fell.

 

“Whoa. What a power.”

 

Was that a compliment or simply a word of amazement, Ryuu decided it was not important to know. With a slight difficulty, he cut the trunk into smaller logs.

 

He did notice that the spirit had not disappeared yet from his side. Instead, the damn trickster was watching Ryuu cutting the woods with slightly wider eyes.

 

_Yep. Certainly from amazement._

 

And so Ryuu kept pretending not to notice him. Raise, chop. Raise, chop. Raise, chop—rinsed and repeated until he got the amount he thought would suffice for winter days. He put them in a pile, tied it with a strong rope, and then carried it on his back. When he was about to leave, the spirit suddenly spoke: “You’re much tougher than I thought.”

 

Ryuu quickly whipped his head to see him and gave him middle finger. “Hell yeah I did! Now shut up and disappear like you always did, you damn fox!”

 

That surprised the spirit. His lips formed an amused smile, this time not hid behind his kimono sleeve. “Very well, then. Let’s meet again when you’ve fully fixed that broken heart of yours, human.”

 

And so he disappeared from Ryuu’s sight.

 

Ryuu snorted, and turned to face forward again.

 

Then he was face-to-face with the just disappeared kitsune, which got him screamed in surprise and stepped back.

 

The kitsune was smiling widely. He kept on getting closer to Ryuu, who was still trying to calm down, until the distance between them was less than an arm. Half-stooping in front of him (who was shorter than the kitsune in his human form, damn it), the kitsune chuckled and reached for Ryuu’s chest. With that fox-like amused grin, the bastard whispered, “I shall wait for this to be healed by someone, and then I’ll return to broke it yet again.” Ryuu did not get a chance to get angry. The kitsune was already half-disappearing in mist.

 

His voice, however, was echoing in Ryuu’s ears even after he had fully disappeared:

 

“Until next time, pitiful human.”

 

Not too long after that, Ryuu’s frustrated scream could be heard all the way to his home.

 

**.**

 

“QUIT CURSING ME WITH YOUR EXISTENCE, YOU DAMN FOX!”

* * *

(And that, dear readers, was how Ryuunosuke’s string of bad luck in romance stuffs began)

* * *

**[ _end_ ]**

**Author's Note:**

> Haikyuu!! (c) Furudate Haruichi.
> 
> Thank you for reading till the end~


End file.
